1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electrical connector, and more particularly to an electrical connector having a grounding path to a printed circuit board on which the connector is mounted.
2. Description of Related Art
U.S. Pat. No. 6,811,439 discloses a thin connector comprising an elongated, rectangular insulative housing, a plurality of electrical terminals, a metal plate, and a shell. The housing includes an upper wall and a lower wall, which cooperate to define a longitudinal mating opening for accommodating a mating part of a mating connector. The electrical terminals are arranged in a row and each has a contact beam projecting into the mating opening along the upper wall and a solder tail to be soldered to a printed circuit board (PCB). The metal plate is attached to the lower wall and has a plurality of elastic tongues extending therefrom and projecting into the mating cavity for abutting against the mating connector being plugged in to provide an elastic force thereon opposite to that provided by the contact beams of the terminals for equilibrium purpose. The shell is attached to a periphery of the housing therefore to surround the housing.
The metal plate further comprises a pair of grounding legs bended to be soldered onto the PCB as well as the solder tails of the terminals. As the connector is soldered onto the PCB by a Surface Mounting Technology (SMT), it is required that the solder tails of the terminals and the grounding legs of the metal plate which are together to be surface soldered to the PCB perform a good coplanarity, or else neither facility nor reliability of soldering operation can't be ensured. However, since the terminals and the metal plate are formed from different metal sheets and are assembled on the housing separately, it is difficult to ensure a wonderful coplanarity between said solder tails and said grounding legs.
Thus it is desired to provide an electrical connector in which both a grounding path thereof and solder tails of terminals thereof are reliably soldered to a PCB with facility, and in which the grounding path and the solder tails of terminals together to be soldered to the PCB perform a good coplanarity.